May 26, 1904. 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



375 



thought. The winter season, whose close we hope to see 

 soon, has been very trying on the insects in which we are 

 particularly interested. For nearly five months they had 

 no flight, and during that time there was an unusual 

 amount of cold, stormy weather, zero and below. At tlie 

 present time the spring is fully a month later than usual. 

 Comparatively speaking, little breeding is being done in 

 the hives, and from the present outlook the colonies can not 

 get into very good shape for the white clover, unless it, too, 

 is late. However, no life or business is all a pathway of 

 roses. Each has its trials and discouragements. " Up and 

 it again " is the only way to success after apparent defeat. 

 We learn by our failures ; we gain strength by constant 

 eflfort. Every cloud has a silver lining, and it's an ill wind 

 that blows nobody good. The cry last summer was, ' Too 

 much honey 1' ' Demoralization of prices !' This will surely 

 be righted the coming season by the shortage of bees. < >Id 

 stocks of honey will be cleared out, and prices firmed up to 

 a proper level. Then let all sell judiciously, hunt out neg- 

 lected markets, and avoid overcrowding the large centers." 



MARKETING HONEY. 



Mr. R. H. Smith read a paper on "Marketing Honey," 

 in which he said that honey is much more generally used in 

 Canada as an article of food than it was some years ago ; 

 but the production of honey and competition in various 

 ways has more than kept pace with the consumption, hence 

 the prevailing low prices obtained for honey during the 

 past year. The question may be asked : " What can com- 

 pete with Nature's purest sweet at the same price ?" As a 

 medicine its value has long been recognized, and as an 

 article of food a choice article of comb honey has no peer. 

 It is, however, in the extracted form that honey has more 

 competitors, and, judging by the advertisements of the 

 manufacturers of the various syrups upon the market under 

 the high-sounding titles of "Honey Syrups," "Honey 

 Drips," "Clarified Honej'," "Table Syrups Better than 

 Honey," etc., they are all quite willing to borrow the good 

 name of honey as far as they possibly can ; and it is only 

 by offering their products at a low price that they can be 

 sold. Very few of the consumers of these articles have any 

 idea how these syrups are made. They may know it is pro- 

 duced from corn, and if it has a good appearance and is 

 cheap, it will sell. Perhaps it is not so generally known 

 that sulphuric acid is used to convert the starch of the corn 

 into glucose or syrup, and that it has not been found pos- 

 sible to remove all of the sulphuric acid from the finished 

 product. Many may have seen the statement going the 

 rounds of the newspapers that Mr. Rockefeller, who is 

 largely interested in glucose or corn-syrup factories, is 

 offering half a million dollars for a process that would re- 

 move the remains of the acid ; and the reason for this is, 

 the manufacturers know that unless this acid is removed, 

 which is so injurious to the teeth and stomach of the con- 

 sumer, they can not hope to increase their trade. 



Honey is not advertised as freely as other foods ; in 

 fact, is scarcely advertised at all. The main reason for 

 this is, that honey is, like wheat, a natural food (not being 

 manufactured). If one advertises honey, it is about as 

 much benefit to other producers, so it is not done. The best 

 means of promoting the sale and use of honey is to produce 

 a No. 1 article, to extract only when well capped and thor- 

 oughly ripe, keep the light and dark honey separate, and 

 offer each for what it is. Some bee-keepers make the mis- 

 take of trying to get along with only one super or top story 

 for extracted honey. I think this is a great mistake, be- 

 cause during a good How bees will soon fill up one super 

 with the thin nectar, and then have no place to store, so 

 will wait until this is ripened before they can deposit more ; 

 where, if they had another super given at the proper time, 

 both storing and ripening could go on simultaneously, and 

 the bee-keeper would not be likely to extract the unripe 

 nectar that will always lower the grade of his ripe honey. 



The following resolutions were introduced and passed : 



AGAINST ADULTERATION. 



Resolved, That this Association pass a vote of censure 

 upon Uptons, of Hamilton, for seeking to use the good name 

 of honey for putting inferior goods upon the market, as 

 shown by the Bulletin of the Department of Inland Revenue 

 at Ottawa, and their analysis. That we put ourselvo.-, on 

 record as being opposed to adulteration in any form, and 

 that a copy of this resolution be sent to Uptons, and jmb- 

 lished in connection with the report of these proceedings. 



BEET-SUGAK ItONUS CONDEMNED, 



Resolved, That we, as bee-keepers, put ourselves on re- 

 cord as condemning the policy of the Government in bou us- 



ing the sugar-beet industry to the detriment of the honey- 

 industry, which produces a food much superior to sugar, 

 to say nothing of the value of bees to the farmer and fruit- 

 grower as fertilizers of blossoms. That a copy of this reso- 

 lution be sent to the minister of agriculture at Toronto. 



AGAINST SPRAYING I'KUIT-TREES IN BLOOM. 



Resolved, That this convention condemn the spraying 

 of fruit-trees while in full-bloom, as an injurious practice 

 and a waste of time, labor, and money, as well as a detri- 

 ment to the honey-bee, an insect of value in assisting 

 proper fertilization of the blossom, and likewise contrary 

 to statute law. 



[ Our Bee-KeepinS Sisters j 



Conducted by Emma M. Wilson, Marengo, 111. 



Best Time to Put Foundation in Sections. 



A reason that is not always thought of for putting in 

 the foundation in the year's supply of sections early in the 

 season, is the difficulty of putting in foundation in hot 

 weather compared with cold weather. I never realized 

 what a difference it made until last summer, when, on ac- 

 count pf having a larger crop of honey than we expected, 

 we ran out of sections, and I was obliged to put foundation 

 in several thousand sections in hot weather. 



I had always enjoyed putting in foundation, but I 

 changed my mind about it when the warm foundation 

 doubled up under my fingers and I was obliged to hold each 

 full sheet until it was cool enough so that its own weight 

 would not cause it to drop out. It was rather slow business 

 compared with putting it in in cool weather, and not nearly 

 as satisfactory, either, for I never felt quite sure whether it 

 was going to stay where it was put or not. 



The only way that I could accomplish anything was to 

 get up at 4 o'clock in the morning and work for two or three 

 hours before it got so warm, and that is what I did. About 

 that time I decided that it would be the wise thing to have 

 such a big, big lot of sections ready that there would be no 

 possibility of having to put in foundation in hot weather. 



The Golden Rule and Starting- Apiaries. 



On page 327, Mr. Ricketts asks whether a person who 

 owns a piece of ground has not the right to start upon it an 

 apiary, regardless of any surrounding bee-keeper or bee- 

 keepers. Legally he has an entire right to do so, and at 

 first blush one would say that one has the same right morally 

 as he has to establish on his own ground a pig-pen. But 

 there seems to be a belief quite common among bee-keepers, 

 becoming constantly more common, that when a man is 

 making a business of bee-keeping, with bees enough to 

 utilize all the nectar within reach, it is not a nice thing for 

 another man to plant right beside him another apiary. 



It is perhaps an unfortunate thing that some plan has 

 not been put in operation that would give legal right, by 

 paying a certain amount, to a certain territory, but lacking 

 that, the Golden Rule is a good thing to follow. Suppose 

 Mr. Ricketts should make his living at bee-keeping, having 

 his all invested in it, and then suppose a large land-owner 

 should bring an equal number of colonies and plant them 

 right close beside Mr. Ricketts, thus making the business 

 of both an entire failure ; would Mr. Ricketts feel that that 

 land-owner had been strictly following the Golden Rule? 



Honey that Seems to Be Yeasty. 



In the South they seem to have some trouble with honey 

 that is obtained from cabbage palmetto and perhaps from 

 other sources, the honey never ripening in the hive, but 

 working like yeast in the cell.s. Even if only a little of this 

 acid honey is stored along witli otlier honey in the hive, it 

 makes trouble with the w! -le. Mrs. S. A. Smith, the 

 Florida woman who was bright enough to invent a bee- 

 brush, is also bright enough to turn to advantage this ob- 



